Scientists have found a fossil plant with leaves, a fruit and a flower bud in rocks from Inner Mongolia. These are distinctive features of angiosperms, the scientific term for flowering plants. The fossil plant has been named Florigerminis jurassica and is one of the oldest dated flowering plants found so far. The fossil is dated […]
Self-pollinating orchid found according to a report in Nature, vol. 441, p945, 22 June 2006. Flowers are fertilised when pollen is placed on the stigma, the female part of the flower. Although most flowers produce pollen they rely on outside agents, such as insects, to bring pollen to their stigma and take their pollen to […]
Adaptable orchids use epigenetics, according to ScienceDaily, 10 Aug 2010 and Molecular Biology and Evolution, 2010; DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msq150. Scientists at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew’s Jodrell Laboratory are studying the effects of epigenetics in orchids to see how they may adapt to environmental changes. Epigenetics refers to changes in the way genes are expressed. These changes […]